In
a 1980 interview for the German magazine Stimme des Glaubens published in October
1981, John Paul II was asked explicitly to speak about the third secret. He
said:"Because of the seriousness
of its contents, in order not to encourage the world wide power of Communism
to carry out certain coups, my predecessors in the chair of Peter have diplomatically
preferred to withhold its publication. On the other hand, it should be sufficient
for all Christians to know this much: if there is a message in which it is said
that the oceans will flood entire sections of the earth; that, from one moment
to the other, millions of people will perish... there is no longer any point
in really wanting to publish this secret message. Many want to know merely out
of curiosity, or because of their taste for sensationalism, but they forget
that 'to know' implies for them a responsibility. It is dangerous to want to
satisfy one's curiosity only, if one is convinced that we can do nothing against
a catastrophe that has been predicted." He held up his
rosary and stated "Here is the remedy against this evil. Pray, pray and
ask for nothing else. Put everything in the hands of the Mother of God."
Asked what would happen in the Church, he said: "We must be prepared to
undergo great trials in the not-too-distant future; trials that will require
us to be ready to give up even our lives, and a total gift of self to Christ
and for Christ. Through your prayers and mine, it is possible to alleviate this
tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because it is only in
this way that the Church can be effectively renewed. How many times, indeed,
has the renewal of the Church been effected in blood? This time, again, it will
not be otherwise. We must be strong, we must prepare ourselves, we must entrust
ourselves to Christ and to His holy Mother, and we must be attentive, very attentive,
to the prayer of the Rosary.

Lúcia
herself is reported to have explicitly stated that the Third Secret contains
Apocalyptic content. According to one source, when Lúcia was asked about
the Third Secret, she said it was "in the
Gospels and in the Apocalypse", and at one point she had
even specified Apocalypse chapters 8 to 13, a range that includes Apocalypse
12:4, the chapter and verse cited by Pope John Paul II in his homily in Fatima
on 13 May 2000.

A
news article quoted former Philippine ambassador to the Vatican, Howard Dee,
as saying that Cardinal Ratzinger
had personally confirmed to him that the messages
of Akita and Fatima are "essentially the same."

A
TERRIBLE WARNING - THE MESSAGE OF OUR LADY OF AKITA, JAPAN: The third message
on October 13, 1973, the actual anniversary of the final visions and miracle
of Fatima is as follows: "As I told you, if men do
not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment
on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one
will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a
great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests
nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will
envy the dead. The only arms which will remain for you will be the Rosary and
the Sign left by my Son. Each day, recite the prayers of the Rosary. With the
Rosary, pray for the Pope, the bishops and the priests. The work of the devil
will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals
opposing cardinals, and bishops against other bishops. The priests who venerate
me will be scorned and opposed by their Confreres. The Church and altars will
be vandalized. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the
demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of
the Lord.

From
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in Vatican

Text
of The Third Secret of Fatima:

COMPLETE
TRANSLATION OF ORIGINAL TEXT

VATICAN
CITY, JUN 26, 2000 (VIS) - Given below is the complete translation of the original
Portuguese text of the third part of the secret of Fatima, revealed to the three
shepherd children at Cova da Iria-Fatima on July 13, 1917, and committed to
paper by Sr. Lucia on January 3, 1944:

"I
write in obedience to you, my God, who command me to do so through his Excellency
the Bishop of Leiria and through your Most Holy Mother and mine.

"After
the two parts which I have already explained, at the left of Our Lady and a
little above, we saw an Angel with a flaming sword in his left hand; flashing,
it gave out flames that looked as though they would set the world on fire; but
they died out in contact with the splendor that Our Lady radiated towards him
from her right hand: pointing to the earth with his right hand, the Angel cried
out in a loud voice: 'Penance, Penance, Penance!'. And we saw in an immense
light that is God: 'something similar to how people appear in a mirror when
they pass in front of it' a Bishop dressed in White 'we had the impression that
it was the Holy Father'. Other Bishops, Priests, men and women Religious going
up a steep mountain, at the top of which there was a big Cross of rough-hewn
trunks as of a cork-tree with the bark; before reaching there the Holy Father
passed through a big city half in ruins and half trembling with halting step,
afflicted with pain and sorrow, he prayed for the souls of the corpses he met
on his way; having reached the top of the mountain, on his knees at the foot
of the big Cross he was killed by a group of soldiers who fired bullets and
arrows at him, and in the same way there died one after another the other Bishops,
Priests, men and women Religious, and various lay people of different ranks
and positions. Beneath the two arms of the Cross there were two Angels each
with a crystal aspersorium in his hand, in which they gathered up the blood
of the Martyrs and with it sprinkled the souls that were making their way to
God."

.../THIRD SECRET/...

Saint
Hildegard (12th Century)

The
time is coming when princes and peoples will reject the authority of the Pope.
Some countries will prefer their own Church rulers to the Pope. The German Empire
will be divided.
Before the comet comes, many nations, the good excepted, will be scourged by
want and famine. The great nation in the ocean that is inhabited by people of
different tribes and descent will be devastated by earthquake, storm, and tidal
wave. It will be divided and, in great part, submerged. That nation will also
have many misfortunes at sea and lose its colonies.
[After the] great Comet, the great nation will be devastated by earthquakes,
storms, and great waves of water, causing much want and plagues. The ocean will
also flood many other countries, so that all coastal cities will live in fear,
with many destroyed.
All sea coast cities will be fearful, and many of them will be destroyed by
tidal waves, and most living creatures will be killed, and even those who escape
will die from a horrible disease. For in none of those cities does a person
live according to the Laws of God.
A powerful wind will rise in the North, carrying heavy fog and the densest dust,
and it will fill their throats and eyes so that they will cease their butchery
and be stricken with a great fear.